Green Grocer mark-up, Fresh Food: straight from the Farmers to your Wallet? |
Green Grocer mark-up, Fresh Food: straight from the Farmers to your Wallet? |
May 3 2012, 03:06 AM
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#1
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 136 Joined: 16-April 08 Member No.: 15,899 |
I was looking for the prices of genuine non-ersatz foods in Shadowrun and found myself unable to find them.
I understand that most food available to the general public are clever (or blatent) forgeries made with Soy, Krill and Alge such as Soy-Caff but is there any actual rule behind how much a Real Apple would be versus Soy mixed with apple-flavorant number two and condence-pressed in an apple-shaped mold and given a coating of Alge-based red Skein number six? I mean should we just make it simple and say Four times the current prices for Fruits and Vegetables and ten times current prices for Meat or is there an acutal chart or something I missed? |
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May 3 2012, 03:40 AM
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#2
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Target Group: Members Posts: 79 Joined: 23-August 06 Member No.: 9,205 |
Food prices aren't stated outright, because that's all covered under lifestyle. A high enough lifestyle and you're having real food instead of scop, at lower ones you might be able to spring for real once in a while.
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May 3 2012, 03:40 AM
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#3
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Neophyte Runner Group: Validating Posts: 2,492 Joined: 19-April 12 Member No.: 51,818 |
Things like food are covered by your Lifestyle costs, and left purely as an abstraction.
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May 3 2012, 04:16 AM
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#4
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 195 Joined: 7-July 08 From: Germany Member No.: 16,124 |
I mean should we just make it simple and say Four times the current prices for Fruits and Vegetables and ten times current prices for Meat or is there an acutal chart or something I missed? Some years ago I did an estimate based on the SR3 extended lifestyle rules in Sprawl Survival Guide and arrived IIRC at about three times today's prices. I guess you could adjust that by type of food: robust staples close to today's prices, others like meat more expensive. |
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May 3 2012, 10:08 AM
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#5
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Runner Group: Members Posts: 3,009 Joined: 25-September 06 From: Paris, France Member No.: 9,466 |
This is also highly dependent on the way the GM sees the universe. According to some sources, real meat is extremely rare and expensive, according to others, you can get real meat for less than 10:nuyen: in some restaurants and you can grow organic food in your backyard.
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May 3 2012, 12:34 PM
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#6
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Running Target Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 1,003 Joined: 3-May 11 From: Brisbane Australia Member No.: 29,391 |
"A 280lb pig will result in two halves, each weighing 110 or so lbs. Each of those 110lb halves will result in approximately 75lbs of cut-and-wrapped meat. If you ask the meat shop to do it, they'll also cut and bag the back fat. Otherwise they'll dispose of it (probably into other peoples sausage. Why not eat it yourself? ) There is nothing like lard to make pie crusts flaky and for deep frying and so on. More on lard later.
So the 75lbs of meat from each half will be: 2lb ham hock 13lbs pork chops* 7lbs of bacon 10lbs ribs 20lbs shoulder or sausage** 11bs sausage*** 12lb ham****" A pig costs 250 nuyen 150lbs/pig so pork is 1 2/3 nuyen per pound so cheaper than soy (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) |
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May 3 2012, 02:22 PM
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#7
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Neophyte Runner Group: Validating Posts: 2,492 Joined: 19-April 12 Member No.: 51,818 |
That's the price for a live pig, that you buy at the farm/ranch/whatever. And not necessarily a big, 280-pounder either. (Also, I think that's grossly underpriced, given the presumptions of the SR setting.)
If you buy it from a store, you hve to add in all kinds of markups: transport to the slaughter house; slaughter and butchering; post-slaughter refrigeration; secondary butchering (to turn those 13 pounds of pork chop into two dozen or more individual pork chops); packaging (in those nice sterile, shrink-wrapped styrofoam tray things). IOW: If you can butcher it yourself; if you have the refrigerator and freezer capacity to store 150 lbs of meat for as long as it takes to consume that much before it spoils; ifyou have a vehicle capable of transporting a pig from the ranch to your home .... then, pork may be cheaper than soy. But if you can't do any one of the above steps? You're paying someone ELSE to do it for you. And that means the price goes up. |
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May 3 2012, 03:15 PM
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#8
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Immortal Elf Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 14,358 Joined: 2-December 07 From: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada Member No.: 14,465 |
Farms also now have to deal with Paracritters being born from regular stock.
Nothing ruins a chicken farm faster than a Cockatrice being hatched and farmhands being turned to stone. |
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May 3 2012, 03:21 PM
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#9
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Neophyte Runner Group: Validating Posts: 2,492 Joined: 19-April 12 Member No.: 51,818 |
LOL, that's why you have DRONES handling the baby chicks, until you're sure they're CHICKS, and not cockatrices-to-be. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)
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May 3 2012, 04:48 PM
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#10
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 583 Joined: 6-November 09 From: MTL Member No.: 17,849 |
Come now: Orks with skillwires are much cheaper, and more expendable!
Now you're thinking like a Corp! |
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May 3 2012, 05:19 PM
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#11
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Target Group: Members Posts: 67 Joined: 17-June 09 From: Maine Member No.: 17,288 |
Of course we've been using drones to raise chickens in the real world for years. Corps would probably just make factory farms larger and even more inhumane.
In Shadowrun real meat is expensive because it's a conceit of the game world. Toxic waste, para-critters, evil future diseases, and an uncaring unregulated corporate food industry make it that way for no better reason then it's dehumanizing and cyberpunkish. The rules don't really back it up directly. And to me a reality check on the nature of agribusiness suggests that a corp run dystopian future would probably have more meat in it then less. |
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May 4 2012, 06:50 AM
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#12
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 136 Joined: 16-April 08 Member No.: 15,899 |
Hmmm...
Well my current character has Hydroponics as his hobby skill so he probably could start a grow-op in his basement... *Snicker* and sell his wares on the Black Farmer's Market. "Can I interest you in a pound of gen-you-ine Alma Green? No? How about a few ears of Kansas Gold?" |
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May 4 2012, 06:53 AM
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#13
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Neophyte Runner Group: Validating Posts: 2,492 Joined: 19-April 12 Member No.: 51,818 |
That "grow-op" thing you mention, Ryusukanku? Would be the Advanced Lifestyle Quality Homegrown Farming, which improves the Food aspect of your lifestyle by two entire steps (squatter becomes Middile, low becomes High, etc). (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)
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May 4 2012, 08:28 AM
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#14
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Target Group: Members Posts: 79 Joined: 23-August 06 Member No.: 9,205 |
Yep; consider that having enough food to eat requires a remarkably large area. Hydroponics makes it smaller, but it's still bigger than most lifestyles can't support that without an additional quality.
One place you might be able to is, paradoxically enough, the Barrens. A big enough gang might well have turned parkland into farmland. Looking at Redmond on Google Maps shows a lot of green there that might have been preserved with enough guns. |
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May 4 2012, 08:48 AM
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#15
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Runner Group: Members Posts: 3,009 Joined: 25-September 06 From: Paris, France Member No.: 9,466 |
One place you might be able to is, paradoxically enough, the Barrens. A big enough gang might well have turned parkland into farmland. Looking at Redmond on Google Maps shows a lot of green there that might have been preserved with enough guns. That's what happened in the Plastic Jungles. But I think it's more the exception that the norm when you consider that you have to deal with: - Getting seeds. By 2070, most if not all of the crops are going to be GMO with "rights managements" like the "Terminator" gene used by Mosanto today. With the disappearance of bees and other pollinating bugs, pollination is going to be limited. - Finding a soil that's rich enough to grow crops and not polluted/irradiated enough. - Being able to fight the diseases and parasites - Protecting the crops from (para)critters and looters - Being able to stand against the mafia that will gladly "collect" your natural food to sell it on the black market. I'm not saying it can't be done (the Plastic Jungles are an example), but it's not as easy as one might think. |
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May 4 2012, 08:58 AM
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#16
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Immortal Elf Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 14,358 Joined: 2-December 07 From: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada Member No.: 14,465 |
Seedless Crops are one of the worst travesties ever performed by Corporations IRL, in my mind.
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May 4 2012, 03:44 PM
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#17
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Neophyte Runner Group: Validating Posts: 2,492 Joined: 19-April 12 Member No.: 51,818 |
Yeh; DRM for food, blech.
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May 4 2012, 03:54 PM
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#18
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Immortal Elf Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 14,358 Joined: 2-December 07 From: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada Member No.: 14,465 |
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May 4 2012, 04:22 PM
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#19
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 302 Joined: 11-May 10 From: Hamilton, Ontario, Canada Member No.: 18,569 |
Yeah, and if something happens to traditional seed stock, and all we're left with is seedless... All it takes is one major plague, and we're out a major staple. Bananas are heading that way at a much faster rate than people realize. The variety of banana most people purchase at the grocery store is facing a major plague in two of the three major areas that they're grown. There are other varieties of banana that aren't affected, but they all have different tastes, sizes and/or consistencies that will result in a change in what people think of when they think of bananas. This has actually already happened once before, bananas we eat today aren't the same species as the ones people ate 30 or 40 years ago. Food for thought. |
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May 4 2012, 04:32 PM
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#20
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Neophyte Runner Group: Validating Posts: 2,492 Joined: 19-April 12 Member No.: 51,818 |
The impending extinction of the bananas I've grown up with makes me a sad, SAD man. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)
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May 4 2012, 05:03 PM
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#21
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Immortal Elf Group: Members Posts: 10,289 Joined: 2-October 08 Member No.: 16,392 |
Bananas are heading that way at a much faster rate than people realize. The variety of banana most people purchase at the grocery store is facing a major plague in two of the three major areas that they're grown. There are other varieties of banana that aren't affected, but they all have different tastes, sizes and/or consistencies that will result in a change in what people think of when they think of bananas. This has actually already happened once before, bananas we eat today aren't the same species as the ones people ate 30 or 40 years ago. Food for thought. Happened with potatoes not too long ago, too. |
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May 4 2012, 05:09 PM
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#22
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Running Target Group: Banned Posts: 1,105 Joined: 23-August 10 Member No.: 18,961 |
Happened with potatoes not too long ago, too. Please don't compare the starvation deaths of a million Irish to the increased price of a dessert fruit. |
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May 4 2012, 05:27 PM
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#23
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Neophyte Runner Group: Validating Posts: 2,492 Joined: 19-April 12 Member No.: 51,818 |
Please don't compare the starvation deaths of a million Irish to the increased price of a dessert fruit. Speaking as an Irish-American, some of whose ancestors probably were among the dead? He wasn't comparing anything. Only pointing out what happens when the disease hits a STAPLE crop rather than a luxury crop. |
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May 4 2012, 05:41 PM
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#24
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Running Target Group: Banned Posts: 1,105 Joined: 23-August 10 Member No.: 18,961 |
Speaking as an Irish-American, some of whose ancestors probably were among the dead? He wasn't comparing anything. Only pointing out what happens when the disease hits a STAPLE crop rather than a luxury crop. Second generation American here, all 4 grandparents were off the boat Irish. The potato famine was a political death. If the English had stayed on their own fuck island and left the irish to themselves, maybe a few hundred thousand irish wouldn't have faught lincoln's war, and we'd all have more rights. |
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May 4 2012, 06:00 PM
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#25
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 583 Joined: 6-November 09 From: MTL Member No.: 17,849 |
Yeah, something terrible to add to the list of things humans should feel bad about. Now can we please avoid the impending flame war and get the thread back on topic?
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